Learning Violin without a Teacher – an Option?

“Violin lessons are so expensive!” I often hear that argument when it comes to the decision how to learn this instrument best. Well, being a professional violin teacher I’m probably a little biased but I can assure you: this is complete nonsense.
Have you ever consulted a lawyer or even a notary? Then you know what expensive really means.
A violin teacher normally has studied the stuff at university or academy for at least four, five or even more years. Before he was accepted he had to audition successfully which implies he had lots of violin lessons before. Perhaps ten or more years. We are talking about people with a musical education of at least 15 years before they even started to teach this instrument. 40 or 50 bucks per hour are peanuts when you look at this career.

But let’s start from the beginning. You want to learn playing the violin? Great! It’s an amazing instrument. But you should be aware that all the movements we have to make are very complex. The violin is extremely sensitive when it comes to inaccuracies concerning bow strokes, the violin hold in general, the grip of the left hand, wrist position etc.
Normally, a small mistake in the bowing hand is enough to end up in an unpleasant, scratching or squeaking tone. Very frustrating, especially when you are a little unsure why this happens.
If you have a teacher you can ask him. He will show you how to do it right. Just for you and your specific mistakes.

The problem with our mistakes is: Everyone makes them differently. And there are virtually zillions of them. A good teacher would analyze what’s going wrong and he would present you a solution and additionally some exercises that will help you to avoid those mistakes in future.
On the other hand – if you take a book it might be interesting but it’s always written very general. The book won’t poke you into the correct exercises that are made for you personally.
But there is one really good book I would recommend: Principles of Violin Playing & Teaching by Ivan Galamian.

Books have another drawback. They can’t present the correct movement. They can only show you positions and relations but never movements. The alternative would be a book with DVDs or some videos on the internet. At least they show you (well, they should) how to perform the movements right but again, they won’t correct you if something is going wrong. They don’t hear if you scratch. They don’t care if you squeak.

There are loads of videos out there about this topic. The vast majority is rubbish. I’m desperately trying to avoid a nasty four-letter-word here. Really. I’ve seen so many bad videos on the net I stopped counting them. Many of them show things simply wrong. Starting from the wrong bow hold, ending with a horrible tone because of that. My impression is – the “teachers” had a few violin lessons themselves and decided “well, now I’m good enough to show others how it really works.”
Yesterday I saw a guy with a good bow hold and an almost correct violin hold. I thought “hey that’s it!” And then he started to play. Oh, my God…

But there is a good website I recommend:
http://www.violinmasterclass.com/
It’s called Violin Masterclass. The violinist is Kurt Sassmannshaus, a renowned teacher who wrote some really good books about the violin as well. There are also several videos at this site showing different playing techniques.

In my opinion the most rewarding procedure would be: Get a good teacher as soon as possible, buy some good books about violins and violin playing, watch videos of good players and capable teachers and read some nice blogs.
Like this here…

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